TITLE: Paper Soul's
AUTHOR: Allie Burke
AGE GROUP: New Adult
GENRE: Dark, Literary Fiction
RELEASE DATE: October 10, 2014
PUBLISHER: Booktrope
BOOK BLURB:
From the author of the genre-defining Enchanters series, comes a new literary tour de force about Emily, a young woman balancing two worlds between her fingertips: the one that is real to her and the one that is real to everyone else…
The question is: which one will she choose?
Never romanticizing what it means to be a twenty-something schizophrenic in a world broken by normalcy and half-baked fairytales, Allie Burke’s latest novel unites Emily and her world at large spanning from the streets of Russia, to the sheets of her bed, to the idiosyncratic comfort she gets from worlds that don’t exist at all.
Woven with angst and darkness, bursting with heartache, Paper Souls tells of the irreparably damaged and broken, and how they survive.
Check out this exclusive Excerpt from Paper Souls!
Please note, blurb and excerpt content are subject to change in editing.
EXCERPT
Paper Souls by Allie Burke
An excerpt from Chapter 11
Release Date: 10/10/14 by Booktrope Editions
Mia’s wedding wasn’t really a wedding. She wore a white dress and had dinner and cake, but there was no real ceremony that anyone outside of the most immediate family was invited to. They went to a courthouse or something—Emily didn’t know—and wanted family and a very limited amount of friends (the limited amount of friends being one, in this case) to join them for dinner.
At her house, Emily had on a red dress, a gorgeous see-through thing that her grandmother had bought for her before she passed. Her grandmother had had the best taste, even at eighty. Emily was only wearing it because Mia wanted her to, but when she got in her car, she looked down at the bottom of the dress that was basically bunched up at her waistline, and rushed back inside to change. There was no way she could go fraternize with Mia’s family in a piece of fabric fit for a prostitute.
She changed into the dress she wore to her grandfather’s last birthday party, the one her aunt told her made her look like Taylor Swift when she gave it to her, and due to the memory of that particular conversation in an elegant bathroom in her grandmother’s house, Emily resisted the urge to change again.
Walking to her car in a pair of heels that were fit for a girl half her height, a diamond bracelet her grandmother had said was a gift from her mother but had actually purchased herself, she tried not to think about how pale her legs probably looked. She wasn’t oblivious to her sex appeal, but she didn’t like dresses, or anything that was comparatively lacking in comfort. If she could have gotten away with jeans and a hoodie she would have. But her Em-clothing was in the car, and it would be just a few hours before she could peel this shit off.
Emily was always early to everything in those days, partly because she was nothing if not punctual, but mostly because she didn’t have anything better to do. Except read. Which she would most definitely trade for dinner.
Regretfully, past a few twists and turns through lobbymen and various haphazardly placed bars, Emily walked into a Mia-less dining room. Mia’s family members and their respective significant others were there, staring her up and down as if she were an alien on display.
Hi, Emily forced out through her constricted chest. She didn’t breathe. I’m Emily, Mia’s—
Happy Birthday. Emily’s eyes twitched before she focused on the speaker. Emily felt her head tilt so far to the right that her ear was resting on her shoulder, but she couldn’t stop it. The woman had the kind of beauty Emily would be attracted to if she was romantically into women. She had some of Mia’s features, yes, but she was so much prettier than the societal standard that was Mia. She had skin that glowed under the dim lights, and silky dark hair, and wore her black dress with class though she was not thin by any stretch of the word. She was so beautiful.
We were in the car, the woman said, when Mia left your birthday message.
Thank you, Emily nodded slightly, taking a seat at the long table.
So you’re the friend, another woman said sarcastically, dark shadow plastered over her eyes and collagen practically leaking out of her lips. She began to drill Emily on where she lived, what she did, and how she knew Mia. She was obviously another sibling of Mia, and she was obviously a major bitch.
Emily closed her eyes, gulping down a monster of a breath as the room began to spin. She never did like that ride at the carnival that spun so quickly that you were slammed against the wall as the floor began to drop, and this was no different. She clutched the edge of the dining table for support. Voices of The Shadow started in deliberately, whispering in both ears as his voice filled her head like a thick, dark cloud and overpowered the voices of the people she was actually sitting with. Emily knew this situation all too well and as the man’s foreign language escalated and began to screech at her, she reminded herself that from the outside, all she was was a woman sitting at a table with her eyes closed. She didn’t make a sound; she didn’t move. She was no different than someone falling into meditation in public. Though, that wasn’t necessarily normal either, but if she had been reacting like she should to a situation such as this one, someone would have already called the police. She could regain control over this situation if she did it now.
His growls came from a lightless world that was not her own. Her instinct was to twitch as he snarled right next to her ear, to back herself into a corner of the elegant room and force her head between her legs until it stopped, but she couldn’t do that. Not here.
She opened her eyes. A twister of harsh wind filled the restaurant, slapping her hair across her face. It hit her dead on, and a bang crashed just where she was sitting, it would seem, like a bomb exploded in her head. The harsh sound signaling the release of the creatures from their undefined prison, birds with harsh lines for wings the color of cream corn filled the elegant room, squawking like crows. Emily closed her eyes, breathing through her nose, and her eyes popped open without warning, as if she were a member of the undead.
Before her lay the scene that she had walked into ten minutes before. An undisturbed room set for a wedding celebration. Save for the ten people who were staring at her as if she were an alien. Emily smiled and calmly forced her hand upwards. Her fingertips grazed her forehead.
Migraine, she said sweetly.
Mia’s presence with her new husband saved her then as she entered in a wedding dress and a smile appropriate for a queen.
Happy Birthday, she said, and they ate lemon-roasted chicken.
About the Author...
Her life is a beautiful disaster, flowered with the harrowing existence of inherited eccentricity, a murderous family history, a faithful literature addiction, and the intricate darkness of true love. These are the enchanting experiences that inspire Allie’s fairytales. From some coffee shop in Los Angeles, she is working on her next novel.
Connect with the Author...
....
Coordinated by:
Jennifer Gilbert at...
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.